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3.77 AVERAGE
3.77 AVERAGE
This book was hysterical, but I got tired of it, and moved on to novels about 2/3 through. So take that for what you will.
I do not think that I have ever laughed out loud more when reading a single book, it was satirical, comedic, and straight up hilarious, I can honestly say that Franken is a new hero of mine, and Al, if you ever see this review, I accept the challenge to a fight, because what could be better than a democrat fighting a republican?? Two democrats fighting each OTHER now THATS not for sissies!
I so recommend the audio version! Franken's ability to crack me up while educating me couldn't possibly have been replicated in print--it's all about timing. The fact that this was printed during the Bush era was unbelievably comforting. One couldn't possibly believe that things could get any worse; they did. Same old, same old. Had I listened to this when it was published, I would have felt despair that the state of politics, journalism, and the presidency could be so abysmal. But since I have the privilege of hindsight, I can say that I may be overreacting a bit to the deplorable state of all of these things today--they were awful then, too. I feel less.....shock. People who are much older than me have tried to tell me as much, but I didn't listen. Franken, with this now way outdated treatise on the mythical "liberal media" and the lies of people in power made me realize that politics and leadership in this country are just disgusting, but this is in no way a new thing. I disagree with the reviews that claim that this is just mud-slinging that is equivalent to the mouth diarrhea that one finds on Fox news and talk radio; he refutes lies with well-researched (and properly cited) facts. The relatively minimal name-calling just contributes to the delightful humorous tone of such a serious undertaking. Bravo. I'll read anything he writes.
Believe it or not I really did enjoy reading this book. The premise of it, in my opinion, is that Al Franken and his Harvard-financed rag-tag team of hand-picked Republican haters (hereafter called TeamFranken) set out to show that any popular political pundit who criticizes Democrats has lied, and because of this we should never believe anything they say. His main targets are Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity, the Bush administration, and Bill O'Reilly. Along the way he smacks around Bernard Goldberg and Fox News. For the most part he does point out some pretty suspect behavior.
Because Franken was a writer for Saturday Night Live, the book was funny, in a satirical way. Toward the end of the book though, TeamFranken breaks from their theme and starts in on why the GOP stole the election, why Clinton was the greatest President, and why all things liberal are way better than all things conservative. For me this was where he lost his credibility. While I didn't feel like fact-checking every piece of information in the book, there were some items (the election and Iraq come to mind) that have been hashed and re-hashed so much that even I could see that TeamFranken were the ones lying and misleading. Also Bernard Goldberg does a much better job of pointing out problems with the MAINSTREAM media being liberally slanted in his book than TeamFranken could even begin to refute. TeamFranken spent much of their time bashing the Washington Post, FoxNews, and the Wall Street Journal.
It was entertaining to see his attack on Bob Jones University backfire. He basically lied to them about being interested in enrolling his nephew there. He does say they were very friendly and not too threatening with their ideals. But that doesn't stop him from trying to tie the University's founder to Nazi Germany by way of some valuable campus art. Of course the reason he tells the Bob Jones story is to point out that to be a good liar you must be really mean and have no ethics or morals. He therefore is not a good liar. He is a liberal, and liberals are good.
A lot of the rest of the topics included Barbara Bush, the Wellstone memorial, the tone in Washington, the environment, racism, education, and weapons of mass destruction. Franken's issues with these topics may have some truth behind them, but in my opinion, his complaints all boil down to politics. Both sides are going to massage statistics and subtly mislead people to get votes. I didn't put much stock in these rants. As Franken himself says (twice), "statistics don't lie". But, as they say, if you beat statistics long enough, they'll tell you what you want to hear.
At the end of the day, though, this was a Republican bashing book in much the same vein as a Hannity or Coulter book. Read this book if you enjoy drinking the Liberal kool-aid.
Because Franken was a writer for Saturday Night Live, the book was funny, in a satirical way. Toward the end of the book though, TeamFranken breaks from their theme and starts in on why the GOP stole the election, why Clinton was the greatest President, and why all things liberal are way better than all things conservative. For me this was where he lost his credibility. While I didn't feel like fact-checking every piece of information in the book, there were some items (the election and Iraq come to mind) that have been hashed and re-hashed so much that even I could see that TeamFranken were the ones lying and misleading. Also Bernard Goldberg does a much better job of pointing out problems with the MAINSTREAM media being liberally slanted in his book than TeamFranken could even begin to refute. TeamFranken spent much of their time bashing the Washington Post, FoxNews, and the Wall Street Journal.
It was entertaining to see his attack on Bob Jones University backfire. He basically lied to them about being interested in enrolling his nephew there. He does say they were very friendly and not too threatening with their ideals. But that doesn't stop him from trying to tie the University's founder to Nazi Germany by way of some valuable campus art. Of course the reason he tells the Bob Jones story is to point out that to be a good liar you must be really mean and have no ethics or morals. He therefore is not a good liar. He is a liberal, and liberals are good.
A lot of the rest of the topics included Barbara Bush, the Wellstone memorial, the tone in Washington, the environment, racism, education, and weapons of mass destruction. Franken's issues with these topics may have some truth behind them, but in my opinion, his complaints all boil down to politics. Both sides are going to massage statistics and subtly mislead people to get votes. I didn't put much stock in these rants. As Franken himself says (twice), "statistics don't lie". But, as they say, if you beat statistics long enough, they'll tell you what you want to hear.
At the end of the day, though, this was a Republican bashing book in much the same vein as a Hannity or Coulter book. Read this book if you enjoy drinking the Liberal kool-aid.
The title of the book could use some more sophisticated diction.
At times this book is funny, irreverent, and vindictive. It draws on many anecdotes from Franken's interactions with conservative media and political figures and then uses those anecdotes to bash them. However, I think the best descriptor would be dated. I would recommend his current book instead.
Even though this book is very satirical and funny, there's also a lot of good information here---things I didn't know about certain conservative morons. Also, unlike his less-intelligent detractors, Franken also provides documentation for his claims.
Really good book, though it's about very bad things. Some of the content I'd already heard on Franken's Air America radio show, but it was a good read nonetheless. Pretty easy to get through and provided very useful info.
funny
informative
fast-paced
I agree with Franken's points, but he doesn't make them very well. I'm not sure we need more vitrolic rhetoric in today's political debate.